Wednesday, August 29, 2007

I'm posting a second photograph today because what we did last night was so darn fun: a duct tape boat race. I think I've mentioned that I work with our church youth group, specifically the girls, and Tuesday night we challenged the boys to a race in boats made only of duct tape and cardboard.

Pictured is the H.M.S. Clark, mysteriously christened as a British boat and better built than a Yugo, right down to its duct tape oar locks. That's what happens when testosterone meets duct tape--a full catamaran?? The other two mens' boats: The Free Willy II and The Priest Craft which looked more like floating feeding troughs didn't fare as well once they were put to sea.

And the girls? Well with our yar little sloop affectionately named The Lucky Banana we went for a minimalist, cubist approach and covered a very large box in 17 layers of duct tape--have you ever wondered what $60 dollars worth of duct tape looks like? We didn't win for speed (there's a reason we didn't name her The Quicksilver) but we won on a technicality as we were the only craft that didn't end up disqualified. Grace and Paige who had been elected captain and crew did us proud.

We raced at Jewel Lake and drew quite a crowd. Here's a video clip of the start of the race--please forgive the lines on the screen, it was so sunny and bright the glare nearly killed us.

This looks like a great youth or even a community project! Red Green would be proud. ( I don't know why I enjoy that silly show so much).Anyway, congratulations to your winners who created a seaworthy craft.

Priest Craft! ha. Very creative. In college, I had a "red-green show" night and everyone had to make something using only ONE roll of duct tape. We ended up with expandable and actual hooking suspenders, a wallet, and (A) shoe. Very fun!

Two boats were disqualified for having hidden flotation devices taped between the cardboard (though it was openly admitted, no cover up intended) and the catamaran was disqualified because they had people off the boat pushing and paddling I think. Something like that. I think a lot of the reason the girls "won" was because they were nicest :) But the winning issue wasn't much of an issue--everyone was just having a lot of fun.